Anyone who knows me at all knows that I'm a yogi. A yogi in the sense that yes, I do practice and love yoga. But I am by no means an expert—after several years of dedication, I still can't hold Crow Pose for more than a few seconds and refuse to even try Headstand for (the perhaps irrational) fear of crushing my cervical spine. Yet, I have been dedicated to Vinyasa flow for a few years now and have finally found myself to be the person the other students in class look to when copying poses.

Honestly, I'm impressed with myself at this point. I've always had pretty shitty balance, so finding myself flawlessly holding Tree Pose for minutes at a time still surprises me. And it's not like I can afford a private yoga instructor because, you know, real life, so perfecting my alignment is all up to me—aside from occasional hands-on teachers. (To whom I apologize, because I'm usually the sweatiest one in the room.)

In my ongoing quest to work on my posture and improve my heinous hand-eye coordination, I stumbled across the world's first floating yoga mats.

Aqua BaseBoards are made solely for use in the water. And they just so happened to have made their debut a few months ago at a New York City gym not too far from me, TMPL GYM. In fact, TMPL is the first gym in the United States to have Aqua BaseBoards, although they've previously popped up across the pond in London and Paris as well as Dubai. The very fitting class name: Holy Water.

I decided to take the quick subway ride to TMPL to try out Holy Water for myself.

When I asked TMPL group fitness manager Bryan Jarrett where he'd even seen the things, his answer was, naturally, social media. Of course. "When I saw the video from Aquaphysical on Facebook over the summer, we knew we needed [the mats and classes] at TMPL," Jarrett tells SELF. You can purchase your own AquaBase for a cool $700, complete with the necessary accessories, bells, and whistles, but considering how difficult I found the Holy Water class (more on that in a sec), I would 100 percent NOT recommend purchasing one unless you, um, own a fitness facility.

Living off two subway lines that run right by TMPL made me one lucky yogi and writer. The other thing about being a fitness writer in New York City? I've got my ear to the ground when it comes to buzzy classes, new gym openings, and the latest instructor who will kick your ass during lunchtime at the nearby SoulCycle. I got a hot tip that Holy Water—a members' only class at TMPL—was so popular that the entire sign-up process had to be modified. With a cultlike following and a cultlike name, I was ready to fall in.

The class challenged everything I thought I knew about my balance skills.

According to Jarrett, Holy Water, currently offered twice a week at TMPL, uses carefully tethered AquaBase boards in a saltwater pool, which I found to be far from cold (basically a miracle…but then, it is Holy Water class), to ensure proper form while maintaining balance. As a balance-challenged but yoga-comfortable everyday athlete, I was ready to pray.

The water really forces you to maintain proper alignment and balance, Jarrett told me. In order to hold certain postures and perform certain exercises—and actually stay afloat—you have to actively use your stabilizer muscles (aka your core). And holy shit, you guys, was he right. Just after hopping on and nailing Child's Pose like an ace, things turned less than holy, you could say. I can normally own my transition from low lunge to high, but I was actually the first person in our class of about 10 to plunge into the pool. It was all the proof I needed that while I may think I'm flowing perfectly during every Vinyasa, I could heed a bit more attention to my transitions, especially utilizing my core.

But part of the fun, once I broke the ice (or the saltwater, as it were), is falling.

There's even a short section of the 45-minute class that split us up into two groups, challenging each other to knock one another off—you know, to see who really can walk on water. Well, not really, but I did forearm plank pretty damn hard while the other group attempted to create waves with squat jumps to knock me off my board.

By the end of the class, I was pretty Zen, which is an impressive feat for a gym that honestly feels like a nightclub otherwise. (And that's just a few blocks from the hustle and bustle of Times Square.) Plus, Jarrett made me feel better about falling in quite a bit—remember, I told you guys I'm clumsy. "When I fall in, it usually means that I am progressing to something new that is truly challenging my body to stabilize and get stronger," he tells SELF. "Which inherently means more fun—it feels as if you’re working out at a water park!"

Waterpark, nightclub, whatever: The Holy Water class was pretty churchlike. Visit Aquaphysical.com to check out pop-up classes and learn more about the AquaBase boards.